VITAL SIGNS: BEHAVIOR; Stopping for a Smoke on the Road to Popularity

By Nicholas Bakalar

Published: October 4, 2005

Popular students appear to be more likely to take up smoking than their less popular peers, a new study of sixth and seventh graders in Southern California shows.

The researchers surveyed 1,486 students in 16 schools, determining the popularity of the children by gathering data on the patterns of their friendships.

Their popularity was measured by the number of times a student was identified as a friend by fellow students.

High standing among one's peers was associated with becoming a smoker regardless of the prevailing practices among the students. Even in schools with lower overall smoking prevalence, it was the popular students who were doing most of the smoking.

Researchers also found that the most isolated students -- those who named no friends at all in the class -- were also more likely to become smokers.

They speculate that those adolescents who are isolated from their own classmates may have friends in older grades whose smoking behavior they imitate.

Even after adjusting for parents' smoking, academic performance, sex and other factors, the differences were still striking.

The adolescents who were named as friends by the largest number of their classmates were more than twice as likely to smoke as those students who were named by the fewest.

Thomas W. Valente, the lead author of the study and an associate professor of preventive medicine at the University of Southern California, said that popular children were more likely to become smokers in any setting.

''We found it among schools with high proportions of Hispanic students and in schools with high proportions of Asian-Americans,'' Dr. Valente said. ''There was no difference by ethnicity or gender.''